Kids have worries – from monsters to natural disasters. They can appear at random or may be triggered by everyday events. Their increasing awareness of the world, who is in it, and being able to anticipate bad things happening, can all increase their alarm.

Many of children’s fears can be existential, meaning they are indicative of a child’s growth and development as a separate being. Separation is the most impactful of all experiences and stirs up the emotional center of the brain and can create feelings of fear. As a child becomes increasingly independent, they are less dependent upon their caretakers which may foster some worry. As a child ages, this fear is often transformed into different themes but shares this common root issue.

Understanding boredom in kids is serious business. A mother of a 7-year old boy sat in my office, clearly distressed and said, “I take away my son’s technology and tell him to go play but he has no patience and becomes frustrated which turns into aggression directed at his younger brother.” Nothing seemed to be working to dislodge his lack of enthusiasm and it was starting to take a toll on everyone in the house.

It’s not only parents who are concerned with boredom but researchers as well. Boredom is associated with an increase in rates of depression and anxiety (3), as well as triggering binge-eating leading to obesity (1). It can interfere with learning in the classroom and contributes to school drop-out (2). A survey of US teens revealed that those who reported being bored were 50% more likely than their peers to become involved with illegal drugs, alcohol, and smoking (1,4).

Unfortunately, boredom is prone to being misunderstood and leads to failing solutions such as reducing screen time, altering structured activities and instruction, as well as trying to resolve boredom by letting kids sit in it for a while. When boredom becomes characteristic of a child, we cannot afford to take it at face value. Engagement with the world is one of the best gauges of vitality and overall psychological health. When boredom is reported on a more frequent basis by a child, it can be a sign that development may be getting stuck.

What is boredom?

To answer the question of boredom, we need to first consider what is missing in a child who repeatedly tells us they are bored. A child over the age of three should ideally show signs of wanting to ‘do it myself’ with budding autonomy and independence becoming evident. They should also indicate an interest in learning about new and unknown things.

Kids who are thriving will often be able to shift into play or creative solitude when they are apart from their adults. Signs of vitality include having one’s own ideas, initiative, intentions, and interests. Children should be known for their imagination and curiosity, all of which go missing when a child is characteristically bored.

According to Gordon Neufeld, the problem with kids who are bored is one of emergent energy (5). The bias that drives a child to become their own separate person or independent being is missing or subdued. The word boredom comes from the word ‘to bore,’ indicating an internal void where energy should be coming from. Humans are born with instincts and emotions that should propel them towards seeking and engaging with their environment. Boredom indicates a lack of emergent energy or venturing forth spirit, a necessity if a child is to grow to become independent.

One of the problems with boredom is that when kids experience this void, they start looking for things to fill the internal hole and as a result, we mistakingly believe they need more stimulation. The more stimulation we give a bored child, the more we will miss what is driving their lack of emergent energy in the first place.

What gets missed with boredom is that there is no energy coming from within the child. The bias to become their own person is missing or flat lining. Instead of springing into action there is little energy or signs that they assume responsibility for their decisions or direction for their life. The problem is that the bias to emerge is a fragile energy that thrives only under the right conditions.

How can we help the bored child?

The answer to boredom that has become characteristic of a child is not to tell them to go play or to let them sit in this state, which will only widen and deepen the child’s internal void and lead to further agitation. While it is true that we will all likely experience boredom from time to time, special attention needs to be given to kids who consistently seem to dwell in this place.

The best measure to helping a bored child spring back to life needs to aim at the level of emotions and instincts. We need to get underneath boredom and focus on fueling what propels a child forward in the first place.

The most critical human need that drives seeking and engagement in one’s life is not the provision of food or shelter but of relationship. When a child is vacant and missing it will be their relationship with caring adults that will nourish them back to life. It is releasing them from their preoccupation with relational hunger that will free them from their greatest hunger. These caring adult relationships may need to help a child find the tears they need so that once emptied, they can start the process of feeling full again.

As a child goes missing, it is the adults in their life that will need to keep them moving – from getting them outside, to playing, to reading or doing schoolwork together. Instead of expecting them to figure things out, an adult will need to take the lead and compensate for what is not there until a child is restored to vitality again. It is also important to consider the reasons for the lack of emergent energy in a child – from too much separation in their close relationships, a lack of deep relationships with adults, or wounding from peers that has hardened the emotional system.

While the reasons for a child’s stuckness varies, the pathway to finding a way through does not. It is about filling them up with relationship so that the void inside is filled with us. When we kick start their heart, it will surge back to life and bring with it the spontaneous engagement in life that we long for. When a child has their emergent energy restored, they will venture forth and figure out who they are.

What every bored child needs is an offer to fill them up with an offer they can’t refuse – that of relationship and rest. It seems so simple but is yet so profound, the place that our children spring forth from is the same one where we are firmly planted.

Humans are some of the most complex emotional creatures on earth. From our teenagers who roll their eyes in disdain to our toddlers who cry in frustration – raising kids has few emotional dull moments. What are we supposed to do with their emotions? Why are they so emotional in the first place?

Developmental science continues to unearth the pieces of the emotional puzzle, shedding light on why our kids are so emotional and how we are meant to help them. According to leading neuroscientist, V.S. Ramachandran, emotional development in humans is as sophisticated as the development of logical reasoning. There are a number of key principles that are not well understood when it comes to emotion with the top five listed here.

Emotions and feelings are not the same thing.

We often use the word emotion and feeling interchangeably but they refer to different things. Emotions are the raw impulses, chemical reactions, and action potential that is created when we become activated by something in our environment. The brain has a complex emotional system to deal with arousal which spurs our bodies into action.

Feelings on the other hand are the names and words we give to describe our emotion arousal. A feeling is the subjective appraisal we make for what has happened in our body that has stirred us up. The capacity to name our emotional state and give it a feeling name is something unique to humans and allows us to communicate with others and get our needs met. In short, emotions are the raw underpinnings that stir us up and feelings are how we use language to share this state with others.

Emotions are part of the unconsciousness.

Freud argued for the existence of an emotional unconscious and saw it as instrumental in influencing human behaviour. He eventually abandoned trying to prove it’s existence given his lack of tools and technology to study the brain. I believe Freud would have devoured the neuroscientific evidence today that highlights how we are not always aware of what emotions have stirred us up.

Humans possess an emotional unconscious that we are not always able to access and for good reason. Emotion has work to do. Emotions are what drive us forward to solve problems and effect change when needed. Awareness is a luxury in an emotional system that was designed to work at getting our needs met. A child who cries is not always aware of what is not working for them. This doesn’t stop their emotional system from creating signs of distress so as to bring caretakers near who can help them. In short, emotions are not problems – they are trying to solve them.

Emotions are not always expressed in the situations they were created in.

Emotions can come out of our kids in the strangest of places and at the most inopportune times. Emotions can be displaced such as when our kids explode in frustration after school or when they become agitated before bed time. This is not a mistake but part of a sophisticated design to ensure emotions come out when it is safe for them to do so. It is often better for a child’s emotional system to press down on strong emotions at school as it isn’t always wise to express how you feel among peers.

Doorways to emotional expression can happen at any time or place, with big reactions coming out in the face of small upsets. Emotional displacement can be confusing for adults as they are left to piece together why their child has come undone. The emotional system is like a pressure cooker in many ways. When things get pent up too much or when there is an opportunity provided to open up, the lid can come off.

Emotions need to be expressed.

Emotions are energizing and are meant to fuel us in moving towards getting our needs met. They can be expressed in a number of ways in order to discharge emotional energy. Emotions are expressed when kids play, move, scream, dance, or use their words. While they don’t always have control over how emotions are expressed because of immaturity, kids are moved to ‘get it out.’

Adults seem to hold onto the idea that if they give a child some room to express their emotions then that child might never stop expressing. The idea that expression leads to bigger emotional problems is faulty and fails to understand how emotion seeks expression in the first place. It is by helping a child ‘get it out,’ and dissipating the emotional energy that is trapped inside them, that we help them come to rest again. The biggest problems are not created by expressing emotions but in the absence of this.

Emotions can go missing.

We seem to operate under the false assumption that we are always capable of feeling our emotions in a vulnerable way. This is not true and unsupported by science. For example, children can get hurt yet appear unaffected. They can lack tears when faced with things that should upset them. Teens (and adults) can lack shame in the face of things they should be embarrassed by. The emotional system can press down on strong emotions when needed, and this is not part of conscious awareness. This is not a sign of a faulty system but one that is working hard to prevent vulnerable feelings from coming to the surface. The brain has its own reasons for numbing out emotions, but over the long term this poses challenges for healthy development. When hearts have become hardened, the goal is to render them soft again.

Carl Jung said that one of the most fascinating things to make sense of was the human psyche. I couldn’t agree with him more. The mysteries of the mind beginning with the complexity of the emotional system are what make humans unique. Emotional immaturity poses some challenges when raising kids as they will likely be stirred up often. Their emotional reactions can stir us up too. The goal in raising kids is not to join them in their emotional immaturity and to bear in mind that growth takes time and patience.

Why is it that young children can lock down in protest at the mere suggestion of getting dressed or undressed? Why do school-age kids seem to resist directions and expectations when homework needs to get done? Why do some teens oppose and rail against rules and limits around technology use, driving them to push back at parents? At first glance, these scenarios seem unrelated … except for their capacity to ignite parental frustration and persistence. But they all share similar roots.

Kids come with an instinct to resist and oppose, or do the opposite of what they are told but this isn’t news to parents or teachers. What may be surprising is that resistance can stem from the counterwill instinct that is innate to all humans.

The term ‘counterwill’ was first coined in the German language by Otto Rank, a Viennese psychoanalyst and student of Freud’s. This construct was further developed by Dr. Gordon Neufeld, using the lenses of attachment and development.

Counterwill refers to the instinct to resist, counter, and oppose when feel controlled or coerced. You can feel it arise inside of you when someone tells you want to think, do, or feel. This isn’t a mistake or a flaw in human nature, and, like all instincts, serves an important function. The challenge for parents is that immaturity makes a child more prone to expressions of resistance.

Counterwill is an innate response designed to protect the self when feeling coerced or when facing separation. Children are designed to be directed by people they are attached to – which makes them prone to resist people who they are not connected to. If a stranger starts to tell a child what to do, they should be resistant to their directions. Not just anyone was meant to ‘boss’ a child around. This is a good thing, and preserves a parent’s natural place in a child’s life as being the one to care for them.

Why do kids resist parents they are attached to, though? The answer is because our ‘have to’s’ have become greater than the child’s ‘want-to’s.’ In other words, their instinct to resist has become greater than their desire to follow – which could be due to the amount of control or coercion they are experiencing, a reflection of the depth of their attachment to a parent, or their level of immaturity. A child’s resistance doesn’t mean we have to abandon our agenda, but it does mean we will need to figure out how to hold on to our relationship while steering through the counterwill impasse.

The counterwill instinct is also important in helping pave the way for separate functioning and becoming a unique self. Part of figuring out who you are involves placing a moratorium on other people’s views, agenda’s, wants, and wishes. When other people’s voices are louder than your own, the counterwill instinct helps to create some space through resistance so that you can develop your own perspective. While it may be problematic for parents to be resisted, it can serve an important developmental role in helping a child develop their own mind.

Counterwill responses in kids are not confined to the home and occur to other adults like teachers. The younger and more immature a child is, the more important a working relationship with their teacher will be in order to learn from them. Attachment is what opens a child’s ears to real and lasting influence – not coercion, bribes, threats, rewards, or punishment.

The more responsible a parent feels to lead a child and to care for them, the more provocative acts of resistance and defiance can seem. It is sometimes challenging for parents not to react out of their own counterwill instinct when their children are locked into resistance.

What is true is that the more you push a child who is resistant, the more they can push back and exhibit greater opposition. This can lead to an escalation of tension and conflict that erodes your relationship – ironically exactly what is required to render resistance less prevalent in the first place. Constant battles can create insecurity and anxiety in kids and can adversely impact their development.

The challenge is not to take resistance personally and even expect it. The challenge is to remain in the caretaker position and lead through the counterwill storm. Some of the strategies below require maturity in the parent and the capacity to see the big picture. It is relationship that opens a child’s heart to being influenced by us and serves to create the ideal conditions for development.

So what are you supposed to do when your young child refuses to get dressed, or when your child refuses to do homework or obey technology rules?

Focus on connection first.
What makes a child amenable to following a parent is connection. Before we direct them, we need to get into relationship by collecting them – that is, catching their eyes, getting a smile, focusing on what they are attending to – all before proceeding with our requests. If we need to talk about something that isn’t working, like homework time, then it is best to collect them first to make them amenable to influence.

Reduce coercion when directing.Sometimes when we make requests of our kids we are talking in a coercive manner to counter their resistance before it begins. Statements like, “You have to …” or “You must …” or “You need to …” all serve to raise the counterwill instinct. Consequences are also commonly used to get a child to comply, with statements such as, “You need to do this, or else,” which only exacerbates a child’s resistance.

Press pause, side-step, and revisit the issue when in better attachment.If you are locked into a counterwill battle with a child, then it is often better to take a tactical retreat to prevent wounding to the relationship and to avoid using force to get a child to capitulate to your demands. It is also important to maintain an alpha position in doing so. For example, “I’m going to give you some time to think about this and I will be back to talk,” or “I’ve decided this is not a good time to address this issue.”

Make some room for their own ideas and initiative.If a child is old enough to get dressed or organize their homework, then perhaps it is time to put them in charge of these things? If they are eager to have their own mind and exert their own wishes and wants, then carving some spaces and turning over age-appropriate tasks to them may be a helpful strategy. The types of activities that you would not want to turn over to them would include anything to do with their caretaking such as food, or who they spend time with.

Make amends when needed.
If our reactions to a child’s counterwill have created distance in the relationship, then giving it time and returning to the child to make amends may be necessary. It can be simply done with an apology and an indication that you wish things would have gone better in the discussion.

While our children may claim, “You’re not the boss of me,” we don’t have to take it to heart or react to it. We just need to lead through the counterwill storm, knowing we are their best bet and that they should feel safe and secure in our care. It is okay for our kids to have their own mind, but this doesn’t mean they will always get their own way. One day the child will be the ‘boss’ of him or herself and until our job is done, we need to make some room for them to flex their wings, but not let go of our caretaking responsibilities.

For more information on dealing with counterwill in kids, please see the Making Sense of Counterwill course through the Neufeld Institute, and read Chapter 9 in Rest, Play, Grow: Making Sense of Preschoolers (or anyone who acts like one).

Kids have worries – from monsters to natural disasters. They can appear at random or may be triggered by everyday events. Their increasing awareness of the world, who is in it, and being able to anticipate bad things happening, can all increase their alarm.

Many of children’s fears can be existential, meaning they are indicative of a child’s growth and development as a separate being. Separation is the most impactful of all experiences and stirs up the emotional center of the brain and can create feelings of fear. As a child becomes increasingly independent, they are less dependent upon their caretakers which may foster some worry. As a child ages, this fear is often transformed into different themes but shares this common root issue.

Worries and fears that ebb and flow are part of the human condition, in fact, a lot of the brain’s energy is spent on evaluating incoming information for threats and sending out signals to the body. We don’t always know when we are afraid and have an emotional unconscious that operates outside of our conscious awareness. Joseph LeDoux, one of the world’s leading neuroscientists who studies anxiety, has shown that it is possible to be full of fear yet rendered speechless.

Common Fears and Worries

The following list contains some of the common fears and worries children may express at different ages. Many of these things are related to developmental changes and immaturity. Sometimes children may not able to articulate what their fears are and strategies for helping kids with higher levels of anxiety can be found in Helping the Anxious Teen or Child Find Rest and When the Worry Bugs are in Your Tummy.

0 to 6 months – Babies can show signs of fear at loud noises given they are unexpected and surprising. The loss of physical, visual, and auditory contact with their adults can also lead to alarm because the parts of the brain responsible for object permanence are not fully developed. When they lose contact with someone, they don’t know that this person will return as they lack an understanding that objects are permanent in time and space.

7 to 12 months – A child at this age can show signs of understanding that objects are permanent as well as causality. They realize that their adults can reappear and that they do have some influence on the actions of others, for example, when they cry someone will come to pick them up. At this age, it is common for them to display stranger protest which indicates their brain has developed enough to lock onto one person as a primary caretaker. This can result in playing shy with people they are not in contact with on a regular basis as well as showing preference for being in the company of their primary attachments. They are still often frightened by loud noises as well as objects that suddenly appear or loom over them.

1 year – Separation from parents is a common source of alarm and fear at this age and continues until 6 years of age. A young child is still highly dependent on adults for caretaking, therefore; they can be alarmed when distant from them. They can also be frightened if they get hurt, as well as loud sounds such as toilets flushing.

2 years – Young children at this age often exhibit some fear or animals as well as large objects. Their smaller size as well as lack of understanding about these things likely increases their alarm level. They may also state they are afraid of dark rooms with separation at night becoming increasingly challenging. Young children often feel most comfortable with structure and routine so changes in their environment can be potential source of concern for them.

3 to 4 years – With the increasing development of their brains, a young child’s imagination and capacity to anticipate bad things happening to them or others can increase. Their dreams may become more vivid with monsters appearing as well as other scary things. They can be afraid of animals, masks, the dark, and can seek comfort in the middle of the night when worried. There can be a heightened level of separation from parents because of their increasing independence, as evident in their exclamations of “I do it myself” and “No, I do!”

5 to 6 years – At this age a child may voice fears of being hurt physically as well as of ‘bad people’. Their play may reflect these themes as they start to imagine bad things happening that are not based in reality. They may voice concerns over ghosts and witches or other supernatural beings. Thunder and lightning may also stir them up too. Sleeping or staying on their own can still be provocative as they are just coming to the end of their development as a separate self.

7 to 8 years – Common fears include being left alone and can lead to wanting company, even if they are playing by themself. They may talk about death and worry about things that could harm them, for example, car accidents to plane crashes. They may still struggle with fears of the dark, as an extension of their growth as a separate being.

9 to 12 years – The ‘tween’ they may express worries related to school performance including a fear of tests and exams. They may have concerns with their physical appearance as well as being injured, and death. As they become more of a separate and social being, they can consider and compare who they are against others which can create some alarm. They may state their discomfort that they are growing up and don’t want to while other kids seem eager to leave childhood behind. It is important to note that the more peer oriented a child is, the more anxiety they may experience at this age as they turn to their peers for understanding who they are, When Peers Matter More than Parents.

Adolescence – For the teenager, personal relationships can be a source of confusion, worry, and fears. As they venture forth as a social being they still need to be anchored to caretakers at home to help them make sense of school issues including their friendships. They may voice fears over political issues given their increasing awareness of the world and movement towards adulthood. Some teens show signs of increasing superstition in an attempt to reduce some of the fears they have at this age too. Anticipating the future and what it holds for them can become a source of worry, along with natural disasters, and other themes related to growing up.

Strategies for Dealing with Worries

For the young child their fear is often alleviated through connection with caring adults who provide safety and reassurance. As a child ages, their increasing maturity will mean they will need to find both courage and tears to face their fears. This growth can be cultivated with the help of adults they trust and can count on.

Connection – When kids are worried, the best sources of support will come from their closest attachments. Listening to a child’s worries, acknowledging how they are feeling and coming alongside them can help to lessen their fears. Coming alongside means to listen with full attention and to reflect what you have heard instead of problem solving or negating what they have said. If a child’s level of fears and worries are more persistent and chronic, then taking steps to tackle anxiety may be appropriate.

Play with fear – One of the ways a child’s alarm system develops is by interacting with the world around them. While they may be startled, or show signs of fear, being able to play at this experience can help to diffuse its intensity. As a child plays their brain can integrate the signals as fear is less likely to hijack their emotional systems. Traditional games that can help include hide and seek, peek a boo, board games, to stories that include risk and fear.

Courage and Bravery – Children under the age of 5 to 7 are unable to exhibit courage because of the lack of integration in their prefrontal cortex. They are only able to feel one intense emotion at a time, so their fear can overwhelm them and when pushed, they can become frustrated, resistant, or attack. When a child is 6 or younger, it may be better to use a relationship with someone they trust to walk them into things that might be new or scary. It is important not to let their fears take the lead in terms of deciding what they should or should not do. For kids who are older, helping them to express what bothers them is helpful. When they can find their words for what scares them, they are better able to articulate their desires that will help them be courageous in the face of what alarms them.

Tears – Fears can also be alleviated by helping a child express their sadness about the things that worry them. For example, they may talk about a friend who doesn’t always play with them to not wanting to grow up. Sometimes the only thing left to do is to cry or feel one’s disappointment in the face of one’s fears. This will result in a release of the fear as well as some resiliency in the face of one’s worries.

The brain is a sophisticated alarm system that is meant to be activated when separation is anticipated or real. As a child ages, the shape and form of their fears and worries can change in reflection of their increasing development. The role of adults in their life is to cultivate deep connections with them, listen and acknowledge that they are afraid, help them be cautious, find their tears, or be moved to courage as the ultimate answer to their alarm.

They are few stressors greater in life than having a challenging relationship with one’s child. It can be heart breaking to look at the chasm in one’s relationship with them, often unleashing a desire to close the distance or even withdrawing altogether. The challenge is we cannot make a child love or want to be near us. We cannot make a child trust, depend on, or give us their heart for safe keeping. Attachment is something that is built between two people, it does not follow orders or commands.

This can lead a parent to ask – is it ever too late to close the distance and get a child’s heart back? The good news is no – it is never too late. Attachment is not a fixed entity and can be cultivated with our kids at any age. Relationships are fluid, permeable, changeable, repairable, and can deepen in vulnerability with time, patience, and good caretaking. Parents are relieved to hear this but often have many questions how this can be done. Sometimes we need to stop and consider how the distance between us got there? This involves more than just recounting incidents but understanding their impact on our relationship with each other.

How Do Relationships Get Weakened in the First Place?

The most impactful of all human experiences is being separated from the people and/or things we are attached to. Attachment is our greatest need, therefore, it is the experience of being separated or rejected that has the capacity to wound a child (and us) most of all. Whether we intend to or not, our actions and words can create too much separation physically and/or emotionally.

When getting close to a parent sets a child up to get hurt on a consistent basis, that child is likely to distance themselves or detach from their parent to preserve and protect their emotional well-being. This is not done intentionally but through the activation of instincts and emotions in the brain that are inherent to human functioning and serve self-preservation. For example, if a child is continuously yelled at, shamed, or receives separation based discipline from an adult (time-outs, 123 magic etc.), they are likely to back out of attachment with that adult. Being close sets them up to get hurt. The most wounding experience of all for a child is experiencing a lack of invitation where they want one, of not being cared for, lacking a sense of belonging and loyalty, and of significance.

A child may also experience too much separation from a parent by not being in enough physical promixity with them. Without consistent regular contact and closeness, a young child may find it hard to stay connected when the feelings of missing are so great. While feelings of missing are a natural by-product of being attached, too much of it can provoke emotional defences in the brain to numb out a child’s feelings, tune out the person, or to detach from the relationship to protect the heart. When trying to engage with a child who is defending against the relationship, a parent may get the cold shoulder or be ignored. This can be short lived or ongoing depending on the level of separation experienced and duration.

A further reason for wounding in the parent/child relationship is the parent’s release of unfiltered emotions onto their kids. Relational problems can be created when we are not consistently tempered in our responses to our children and don’t put the brakes on before speaking our mind when upset. Sometimes yells, threats, or other things come out of our mouths before our head can catch up with us to stop us. While we may not intend to hurt our children, sometimes we do harm to our relationship. When emotions flair, it is important to repair the relationship in the aftermath.

There are many reasons why our children may experience separation from us. Sometimes we don’t collect them nor engage them enough so they turn to substitutes like technology or their peers. When there is distance between us the relational void will be filled by something else or someone. This makes it challenging to reclaim a child and rebuild one’s relationship because the child has now found ‘safer’ substitutes to hold onto. The good news is that it is never too late for a relationship to be mended but it may take time, persistence, faith, tenacity, tears, caring, compassion, consideration, and patience.

Three Ways to Cultivate Stronger Connections

While the circumstances behind the challenges in our relationship will be different for every parent and child, there are a few attachment strategies that can be useful in repairing what has been broken.

Consider a child’s receptivity to a relationship and bridge the distance – Before proceeding to cultivate a closer connection, it is important to consider how receptive a child is to having one with you. If the cold shoulder is a consistent response, then bridging the distance between you may be the most important thing to do. Bridging means sending a message to the child that you seek a connection with them but will not pressure them to be closer to you than they are comfortable with. This can be achieved in subtle ways like staying near them, doing small things to take care of them, and orchestrating your time together through structure, routines, and rituals – all of which are less provocative than being in close relationship. The goal is to look for signs of receptivity and whether a child is warming up to being around you. It will also be important to be working on changing whatever is driving the separation between you in the first place as well.

Take the lead in the relationship dance – The responsibility for the relationship lies with a parent. As children become teens and adults, they do have a greater role to play in the relationship but it still doesn’t negate the need for a parent to hold on and send an invitation for connection. It is our job to take the lead, to bridge the divide, to hold on through the storms, to give more connection than is desired, and to be their answer. It is for us to repair or to mend the challenges in our relationship. We must hold on, lead and find a way through the impasses, and to figure out what is coming between us. While we may be frustrated with the response we get in return, it may signal we need to do more soul searching, be patient, or give it time. Sometimes we can get stuck in our persistence and our children in their resistance. Anger and frustrated responses will get more of the same, we need to change our dance steps and chart a different course if we are going to mend the distance between us. If we have apologies to make then we can do this in simple ways and then get on with the business of caring for them.

Collect and engage their attachment instincts – Collecting a child means trying to get in their face in a friendly way or if this is too provocative we can try to get in the same space as them and collect their ears through our voice. We can start with a greeting, sharing something we have in common, or trying to engage the child in conversation or in play. You can talk about the plans for the day or help them with something – there is no shortage of the ways to connect with a child. What collecting conveys is a desire to be close. It is the repeated and unexpected attempts to connect that can slowly make a difference and signal to a child we want a deeper connection. We need to proceed slowly in collecting a child until we see there is receptivity to our invitation. Our expression of warmth, enjoyment, and delight in being around them are the consistent signals to their emotional systems that we are safe to depend on.

What if they don’t take us up on our offer for relationship?

At the root of our deepest upsets in life is feeling the separation or void from someone we desire contact and closeness with. As parents we can take responsibility for our end of the relationship deal, take the lead in trying to repair what has been broken, and change our responses to reduce separation. Our children may take their time in coming back to us and to this I say – hold on. We don’t know what the path holds ahead for us, relationships have a way of turning around over time with warmth, patience, and a consistent message that we are here. If you had your child’s heart at one time, they will surely be looking on some level to come home to you. Be that safe place to return to and hold on to them as you can.

Gordon Neufeld states, “while loving someone may not change that person, it will surely change you.” If we let our hearts grow cold, if we turn away in anger or hurt from the one’s we love, then this will transform us into different people. If we wall off our hearts, we will surely be lost. It is better to find our tears, lean on other relationships that can help us stay the course, and bide our time. All is not lost when we have the courage to hold on and to love our kids through, over, and around the distance that exists between us. We need to hold on and keep making them an offer for relationship that they can’t refuse.

There is much talk of how parents need to avoid overprotecting their kids and allowing them to experience failure as a part of routine life. The idea that adversity teaches resiliency is an important one but only tells part of the story. Why is it that some kids thrive despite the hardship they face while others struggle to survive under the same conditions or better? How do we account for people who face adversity but do not rebound or recover? While hardship is the catalyst for change, it is not the driver of it. Our emotional system is what holds the secrets to human transformation and is where we need to look deeper as we search for answers.

Adversity only teaches when what doesn’t work sinks in. It is our capacity to feel sad in the face of all that cannot change that allows us to become transformed by the experience. It is the acceptance of what is futile that leads us to surrender and changes us in the process. In our quest to cultivate happy, resourceful kids, we cannot eclipse the essential role of sadness and tears in this process.

The Science of Tears

All tears are not created equal. Some are benign like those cried to cut onions. Some have an angry raw edge to them that leave little doubt that someone is full of frustration. Then there are the tears that are soft and sad, where the hurt has happened and the emotional system is pushing towards release and repair. It is these sad tears that make us distinct from other mammal species. It is these tears that hold the secret to adaptation.

For adaptation to occur we need to cease from pursuing things that are futile. For kids there are many futilities in life, from siblings that don’t go away, losing, not being able to turn back time, limits and restrictions, good things coming to an end, and not being able to someone change someone’s mind. When the futility of these pursuits sink in, the brain is rewired accordingly. Neurons that fire together wire together – futility clips the pathways that do not lead to success.

When a child accepts that something is really futile, it can bring feelings of sadness and disappointment or the release of tears. These feelings or tears don’t harm a child but are a sign that healing is underway and are the best indicators of emotional health. It is these children who will be best able to realize their potential as adaptive beings.

Children who cannot experience sadness are often full of aggression and foul frustration. Anxiety and attention problems often occur with stuck tears along with opposition, defiance, and even bullying. It is our tears that make us fully human and humane. Children who lose the capacity to cry tears don’t need lessons but adults who can restore their emotional systems and make them vulnerable again. Failure is only a gift when you have your tears.

What is the role of parents?

The biggest losses in life are matters for the heart and not the head. It is feeling the sadness around what doesn’t work that leads to resiliency, recovery and resourcefulness. The challenge is that these feelings can be overwhelming and children need support if they are going to express them.

In a National Longitudinal Study on Adolescent Health, Michael Resnick and his colleagues found that the single most significant protective factor against emotional distress in a sample of over 90,000 adolescents in the United States was a strong caring relationship with an adult. Resiliency isn’t something we have to teach our children, it is a byproduct of healthy adult relationships. What matters is who a child turns to when upset, who they share their secrets with, and who they shed their tears with.

We need to have our children’s hearts if we are help them to their tears. We need to invite them to express what doesn’t work without trying to fix it. We need to make space for their disappointment instead of problem solving and strategizing solutions. We need to help them name what isn’t working, and to rest from futile pursuits. We need to help them sit in the vulnerability of surrender and communicate that we are confident there is a way through.

Five reasons for why we have a hard time letting our kids cry or feel sad

There are many reasons why tears are unwelcome in children and as a result, can be suppressed or ignored by parents, thwarting their potential as adaptive beings.

The more a parent believes happiness in a child is a sign that they are parenting well, the less they will be inclined to make room for sadness. The underlying belief that sadness is a problem instead of a normal emotion will serve to inhibit expression.

Some parents may feel their children’s tears are too distressing or too frustrating to listen too. We all come to parenting with a different relationship to our own tears and children will act as a lightning bolt in revealing where we are at. As parents we need to make room for the emotions our children stir up in us.

In our quest to raise independent children, there can be a belief that tears are a sign of weakness. Hardiness stems from being able to experience vulnerable emotions and allows a child to bounce back when facing hardship or adversity.

There was a time when tears in men were a sign of virtue and character but this is no longer the case in most cultures. Notions of masculinity and gender stereotypes have made it less acceptable for boys to show these feelings. As a result, boys are not as likely to experience encouragement nor be invited to express these emotions.

Sometimes there is an overreliance on logic and positive thinking which can get in the way of promoting sadness and disappointment. In dealing with adversity, problem solving and fixing things becomes the modus operandi instead of making room for all the emotions that go along with the experience too.

Emotions need to be expressed, feelings need names, and kids need people to share their stories with. When we communicate there is something wrong with tears or emotions, we can prevent children from having a relationship with their emotional world.

We need to affirm for our kids that getting hurt is part of life but the answer lies in facing one’s fears, finding one’s tears, and holding onto someone who is holding on to you. We can’t spare our children from all that comes with the world they live in—this is impossible. It is our job to make sure we don’t send them into it empty-handed.

When we help our kids realize that they can survive what doesn’t work, it can open the door to new possibilities that might. Adversity doesn’t teach on its own, it is the emotional transformation that we undergo that does. We need to be the tear collectors our children require.

Wally, a 21 year old student, glared at me intently as he lept from his chair at the front of the class. He spoke loudly as he demanded, “Tell me why I need to spend 3 hours listening to you on the topic of self-esteem?” Dumbfounded, my internal voice began to stutter. I wondered how he had managed to see my doubt and confusion on this whole troublesome topic. But I had a class to teach, a job I wanted to keep, and 18 people with a combined 36 sets of eyes looking at me – and one of whom was still standing.

I was 2 weeks fresh as a teacher with 17 to 24 year old students who had past histories involving drug and alcohol addiction, criminal histories, as well as abuse and trauma. Who was I to teach them about self-esteem? I never believed for a moment that I was going to increase their sense of self through a lesson plan. I felt disingenuous as their teacher.

My doubt and apprehension was quickly overpowered at my fear of losing the students to a riotous protest. As a new teacher I responded from a place of desperation and stupidity. With an unwavering voice I asked my protestor, “Wally, how many years have you been told you were a piece of sh**?” The classroom was silent with the exception of a few inhaled gasps. Some students looked gobsmacked that I had sworn (me included), while others were delighted that things had suddenly become very interesting.

All eyes were affixed on Wally, waiting for him to respond. Without a moment to think he replied, “that would be 21 years in total Deb”. There was both bravado in his response and a palpable sense of sadness that served to soften us both. In my question he had heard a yearning to help him. In his response he had opened a doorway for us to go through.

I proceeded to ask Wally gently, “Will you give me 3 hours of your life to address the topic of self-esteem then?” He sat down nodding acknowledgement. With his agreement he brought the attention of 17 other students with him.

I don’t remember much from that lecture or lesson plan but I do remember how it affirmed I could survive as a teacher. I realized I could not hide my strong dislike for topics that were aimed at delivering what good caretaking should have, for example, a sense of self-worth.

What these kids needed wasn’t a lesson plan but adults who took care of them. Each of them had their own sad story of how they were left to grow up on their own. My manager assured me that if we took care of the kids first, then the statistics would come and this would tell the story of our success. He was right. Over ninety percent of our kids returned to work or school following the 4-month youth program. I realized in hindsight that what mattered most was not “what we taught them” but who we had become to them.

Every time I present on the topic of self-esteem I recall my dialogue with Wally. He helps me remember what I want to convey most of all to anyone who will listen. If we want our children to feel lovable and worthy as they are then we need to cultivate the relationships that convey they are significant to us.

Wally was right to challenge me as he did. In a funny way I think I gave him the answer he was seeking too – that he mattered to me. It was about welcoming Wally to exist as he was. When Wally graduated from our youth program he seemed to stand a lot taller, more confident in what he had to offer the world. His bravado was subdued, replaced with a sense of self-confidence that was grounded in adult relationships.

Our kids were never meant to work at feeling good about themself nor learn it from a lesson plan. The warm invitation they receive from their adults is what grows them into relational beings who feel lovable and worthy.

Mark Twain wrote, “When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years.” Twain captured the arrogance, self-absorption, and idealism of the teenage years so well. While these characteristics are seen as deficits in the teen, they are byproducts of the changes underway. If a young adult successfully navigates the rites of passage that come with adolescence, they will leave their childhood behind and grow towards maturity.

One of my friends told me she sees adolescence as “one big seizure and period of upheaval.” I imagine her daughter would describe this period in a similar fashion, that is, if she could get enough distance from herself to understand what she was going through. The more we can understand what is going on for the teen, the more we can create the conditions that will help them grow up. The more we make sense of why they behave as they do, the less we are likely to be tripped up by their behaviour. Nature has a plan for our teens and it includes emerging from their ‘adolescent cocoon’ as a mature adult who is both socially and emotionally mature. If development is ideal then this period of transition should naturally resolve itself and bring with it more stability, perspective, and balance.

The dilemma for a teen is they are no longer a child and not yet an adult. These years require them to place their hand on the steering wheel in their own life and play a role in their own unfolding. It will require courage and the ability to handle strong emotions – from fear to frustration. For their parents, it will be a time to mourn the child they are no longer and to celebrate the adult they are becoming. It will mean they will have to find a way to hold onto a relationship with one’s child despite all the things that will come between them.

What Parents of Teenagers Worry About

When I talk to parents of teens, the common concerns they share with me are about drugs and alcohol, peer issues, social media and technology use, sexual activity, school success, and future aspirations. Some parents take a more hands off approach, while some struggle to maintain control over their teen. What I see repeatedly are the changes these years bring to the dance of relationship between a child and a parent. The relationship dance can feel tricky, unpredictable, requiring new moves, and new eyes to understand the emerging adult before you. The teen needs a parent still but doesn’t want to need them. They can push and pull, drawing a parent near only to distance them again quickly.

For those that have enjoyed parenting throughout a child’s early to middle years, the teen years can bring great sadness. The realization that one’s role is moving towards one of consultancy can be met with mixed emotions. Turning over the steering wheel to a teen to make decisions that impacts the rest of their life can seem daunting and alarming. It is a time of trial and error for the teen but for parents there is fear that some mistakes cannot be undone so easily.

What Teens Are Trying to Figure Out

With ideal development a teen will naturally experience strong emotions including alarm, frustration, and sadness. While they may be excited at having more freedom, they may also feel the weight of the responsibility it brings to make good decisions. They may feel more resistant and oppositional when told what to do by their parents as well, all part of the process in trying to figure out who they are. As my high school students used to tell me, “Every time my parents tell me to clean up my room I don’t feel like it – same with homework too. Why don’t adults know that it makes you want to do the opposite?”

The teen can feel bombarded with conflicting information, values, thoughts, and feelings. They may struggle with the lack of absolutes, realizing that nothing is as certain anymore. The childhood period where ignorance was bliss has come to a close and they feel the weight of making decisions where no clear answers can always be found. As they take the steering wheel in their life they will be faced with assuming responsibility for their mistakes and having to plan a reroute. Healthy development is often a time of struggle, one that a teen must face with courage and vulnerability, as well as with support from their adults, if they are to successfully navigate these years.

I often tell my teenage clients that adolescence can bring with it a time of alarm and sadness as much as excitement and expanding awareness. It can be a time of confusion as much as it can bring clarity in terms of one’s identity. It is a time of change, a time of tears, a time to hold on and have faith that the end may look very different from the middle.

How to Hold Onto a Teen

While our teens are trying to figure out how to let go of us and move into adulthood, it doesn’t mean we have to stop holding on to them. The biggest mistake we could make with is to assume they no longer need us. The challenge is we lack cultural practices to guide our teens into adult years. We lack rituals and structure through which they can naturally navigate their adolescent rites of passage. In intact cultures there were ceremonies to mark one’s coming of age, or the adoption of surrogate aunties and uncles to provide some natural distance from parents, and challenges for them to overcome. So many of our teens today feel lost because culture no longer serves as a guidepost to navigating these years of great transformation. The good news is parents can help provide direction to the teen by preserving and protecting their relationship with them.

Connect with them through shared experiences such as eating together, playing games, or music. Research shows teens who have adults in their lives that they eat with on a regular basis are more resilient in the face of adolescent adversity.

Give them space to voice their opinions and ideas, even if you disagree with them. When you listen to their ideas you communicate you are interested in who they are, rather than having them feel you ‘tell them what to do all the time.’

Take care of them in unexpected ways – from helping them to clean up their room to cooking their favourite meals.

Invite them to spend time with you – to go out with or cook with you, even if you think they will likely say no and will want their own space. The idea that you want them close is often nourishing all on its own if a teen has a soft heart.

Give them areas to be in charge of that are age appropriate, such as how they want to organize and decorate their room, making a meal for the family, choosing when they do their homework. If a teen is developing well they should naturally start to take responsibility for areas in their life and parents can step in to play a supporting role when needed.

I love Gordon Neufeld’s statement, “if you don’t feed your cat and your neighbor does, you will surely lose your cat.” This is as true for cats as it is of teenagers. If we are going to hang onto our teens we will need to find a new relational rhythm that honours the changes underway for them. If we are to hold onto our relationship we will need to find a way to ensure their big emotions, such as resistance, sadness and alarm don’t pose a threat to our connection.

We need to make sure we don’t leave them to their peers for guidance or in making sense of the world – nor to their devices. While they evolve as social and sexual beings, our teens still need their adults to anchor them into place. It is our relationship that provides a sense of home and place of refuge, and helps them feel grounded when the changes underway are overwhelming.

Adolescence brings with it the promise of maturity. We may watch in awe and with some alarm as our teens take the steering wheel in their own life. With enough patience, time, and good care-taking they will finally emerge and remind us of the splendor and beauty inherent to human development.

Hearts can grow cold and become hardened, something poets, artists, and musicians have always claimed. From children to adults, emotional numbing is part of the human condition and reveals the inherent vulnerability in a system that was built to feel deeply. As Hank Williams lamented, “Why can’t I free your doubtful mind and melt your cold, cold heart?” The loss to human functioning is tragic as it is our caring that makes us fully human and most humane.

Today we have neuroscience mapping out how emotional inhibition occurs within the limbic system. At last Freud’s theory of how we can be driven by unconscious emotions has gained its neuroscientific footing. Every brain comes equipped with the capacity to tune out what distresses, repress bad memories, dull the pain, suppress alarming feelings, and be divested of caring and responsibility (1). The anthem of the emotional defended is, “I don’t care,” “doesn’t matter,” “that doesn’t bother me,” or “whatever” and resounds loudly among our kids (and many adults) today.

Being defended against vulnerable feelings is an equal opportunity problem not confined by geography, gender, ethnicity, socioeconomic status, or education level. It is a quintessential human issue given our unique capacity to reflect on our emotions and assign feeling names, unlike other mammal species. The three or four year old who suddenly bursts out with their words instead of their hits, “I frustrated! I need HELP!” reveals the developmental sophistication in this system. We were meant to develop a language of the heart, one that takes us towards civilized relating around emotional content.

When Caring Goes Missing

Caring feelings are a luxury in a world that feels like it is coming undone. There are sometimes too many acts of uncaring for a human heart to bear in today’s ‘connected world’ when self centered actions dominate, combined with an absence of shame or fear, and no tears in the face of all that should make us weep. As T.S. Eliot pens in his poem, “The Hollow Men,” vulnerable feelings often go missing not with a bang but with a whimper. We were meant to care deeply – and not just about ourselves but about others too. The hunger for connection is what should hold us together but there are times we seem so intent on tearing these relationships apart. The vulnerable feelings that make us most vital and human go missing for the sake of survival.

When the emotional system flatlines, not only does fear disappear but joy, delight, and enjoyment too. Some of my counselling clients would tell me, “I don’t need anybody, I don’t really care I am on my own” with little emotion. It created problems attaching to others and preventing the love that was there for them in getting through the wall of defenses their brain had erected. They could not feel, despite being aware on some level that they really should be. As one teen said to me, I know I should be happy but I just don’t feel anything right now. When the emotional system operates in a defensive mode, the caring feelings go missing along with their tempering effect on frustration, upset, alarm, and impatience.

How to Revive Hardened Hearts

What is critical to remember is when a heart becomes hardened, the brain has its own reasons for pressing down upon vulnerable feelings. To feel sets the person up to get hurt and the brain is geared towards survival at all costs. To bring emotional defenses down, the heart must be softened. The question is how can this be done? The heart won’t be resuscitated through logic, cognitive manipulation, or behavioural interventions. When our kids lose their caring (or adults), it is the warmth and caring of others that offers the best chance of melting emotional defenses.

According to Gordon Neufeld, a heart can only be softened with the cultivation of safe and caring attachments with others. It is relationship that offers someone the promise of safety, warmth and dependence. It is attachment that is the ancidote to facing too much separation and leads to wounding. The human heart will spontaneously recover and experience vulnerable feelings again when emotional defenses are no longer needed. It cannot get there with a pill, prodding, pushing, cajoling, rewarding, or punishing but only through the warmth of another human being.

What every person needs most of all is a guardian for their heart. As one ten year old said to her mother, “I don’t what it is about you Mama, but when I talk to you I feel such comfort.” One of my clients said her sixteen-year old son said, “Mom, you always seem to know what to say to help me when I am really scared.” This is the job of parenting – to hold on to our kid’s hearts and shield them. As adults, the hope would be that we can rest in the care of another.

Three Keys to Melting Emotional Defenses

Lead into Vulnerable Territory – If we are going to soften emotional defenses and increase vulnerability we will need to lead someone there but this can’t be done without cultivating a strong relationship first. When I trained new counselors they would often ask me for the ‘techniques’ to elicit emotional responses in clients. I would lecture them on how they were asking me the wrong question. The most important part of their role was not a diagnosis or a technique but about showing up as a human being. Psychology does not own suffering, humans do. We cannot expect someone to share their heart with us if we have not earned a place in their life first.

When we have built a strong relationship with someone we can lead then lead them towards vulnerable territory, ever so gently. With a young child it might be reading picture books about characters with big feelings, taking an older child to see a movie such as “Inside Out,” or having chats with teens about the songs they are listening to or the ‘heros’ they admire. It is our job to use our relationship to come to their side and invite them to share their world with us. When appropriate we can reflect back what we have heard in increasingly vulnerable ways such as, “sadness saves the day – who ever thought that would happen!” It is the slow, but consistent message that all of a child’s feelings are welcome and that the relationship can handle what needs to be said, that will slowly bring the defenses down.

To lead someone to their vulnerable feelings we will need to be caring ourselves and model an openness to vulnerability. This doesn’t mean we tell our children our feelings about them but rather reflect on vulnerability as a strength and as being valued. We can then increasingly touch emotional bruises in their life in a gentle way as needed.

Shield with a safe attachment – When a child has a caring attachment that they can take for granted, their heart will be shielded by that relationship. What we forget with our kids is just because we are their guardian, it doesn’t mean they have given us their heart for safe keeping. If a child is truly at home with someone, the hurts in their life can be experienced and made sense of with this person. We cannot protect our children from being hurt all the time, but we can make sure they are not sent out into the world to deal with it on their own. It is our love and caretaking that buffers them against rejection, betrayal, and heartache.

The beautiful design in attachment is that our hearts can shield another’s from injury – it is the ultimate cure and protection. As my children lament about their school day and harsh words from friends, I collect their tears and remind them that they are never too far from home. As I listen to their emotional injuries, my balm is to tell them not to take it into their heart, and to look at me, the one who knows them best. When we feel overwhelmed and lost it is about who we look to that will help ground us, to center us, and to bring us back to ourselves. It is caring that is meant to tie us together and make us caretakers for each other’s hearts.

Protect from emotional wounding and facing separation –If the brain has erected emotional defenses then we can try to reduce the need for them by creating shame-free zones. Typically these would be protected spaces against peer and sibling interactions that are wounding. It would mean minimizing involvement in places where there was a lack of invitation for connection, e.g. a family member that is unkind to a child, or a classroom full of kids who bully.

If the child’s world is too much for them emotionally then we will need to consider how we change their world to reduce the need for defenses. While this may lead to some hard choices, until the heart is back online, there will be problems with behaviour and development can be at a standstill. When the heart is flatlining, resuscitating it become the first order of business.

In reducing wounding we would want to scan the child’s world to see where they face too much separation. This can include forms of discipline that are separation based including time-outs and the overuse of consequences. Moving to more attachment based and developmentally friendly forms of discipline can help to reduce wounding. When problems occur, finding a way to hold on to the relationship in the middle of the storm is the best way through, for example, “this isn’t working, we will talk about this later,” or “I can’t let you do this, I see you are frustrated, I will help you figure it out.” When there are emotional defenses that are stuck, it will be common to have behaviour problems to have to work around until more vulnerable feelings come back on line. It will involve protecting others, including the dignity of the parent and child involved.

What is clear is we cannot ‘will’ emotional defenses to rise or fall, this is not for us to say. However, it is within our capacity to move into relationship with someone, to take up a relationship with their feelings, and to convey that despite everything, it is our relationship that is most secure in their life. If hurting too much is the problem, then surely love is the answer. It is a solution as old as time but one that needs to keep being retold in a world that continues to come undone.